Matt 6:1–18 — Jesus Reveals the Fatherhood of God

Matthew 5 presents the higher righteousness of Christ’s kingdom. It is not produced by the flesh or earned through law keeping; it belongs to those who have recognized their need, come to Christ in faith, and received his grace. Yet this righteousness also fulfills what the law was aiming at all along.

Matthew 6 continues that teaching by revealing the fatherhood of God. The Sermon on the Mount refers to God as Father seventeen times, twelve of them in this chapter. Jesus also speaks of his disciples as the Father’s sons or children. The theme appears when he commands us to love our enemies so that we may be sons of our Father, and when he assures us that our heavenly Father gives good gifts to those who ask him.

What, then, does the fatherhood of God mean? The answer requires us to distinguish Jesus’ teaching from a vague idea that all humanity is automatically God’s family.

The Fatherhood of God

“The fatherhood of God” can sound like a vague phrase from civil religion. Politicians have borrowed the biblical concept and turned it into a general religion that nearly anyone can endorse, without reference to specifically Christian truth.

And they talk about everyone being God’s children. For example, Martin Luther King Jr. Spoke of that. He used this language that we’re all God’s children as a way of trying to advocate for racial equality. But he wasn’t just referring to followers of Jesus. He was saying all of us are God’s children.

The concept of the fatherhood of God that is common in our society is miles apart from the teaching of Jesus here concerning the fatherhood of God in the Sermon on the Mount. I think it’s helpful to compare and contrast these two ideas of the fatherhood of God. The American political version of the fatherhood of God is actually not American. It actually goes back to the 19th century.

It was during that time that modernist theologians in Germany, like Ritschl and Harnack, began to revise Orthodox Christian theology by turning it into a religion that would be universal. In this modernist version of Christianity, The main thing that theologians like Rishel and Harnack argued for was that we have to make a distinction in the New Testament, but specifically in the teaching of Jesus, between the kernel and the husk.

The kernel. That’s the heart. That’s the good, precious seed. And the husk is the outer part that you can just rip off and throw away. The husk was all those aspects of the Christian religion that seemed narrow, that seemed to be related to Judaism, that seemed particularistic, meaning like focused on a particular people, and all the things that seemed like having to do with miracles, and the things about Christianity that were objectionable to the rationalistic modern mind. The husk is all those aspects of the Christian religion and the teaching of Jesus that can be stripped away without any harm. You can just take the husk out and just throw it away, and you’re left with the kernel.

The kernel is that Jesus is the first Christian, that Jesus is the one who gives the highest example of how to have a relationship with God. He was simply a man, so all those doctrines about the Trinity and the Incarnation, those are all speculations that’s part of the husk that we can throw away.

And we can just have this idea of Jesus being a mere man who simply pointed the way to God. Perhaps of all the men in the history of the world, he was the one that was the closest to God, who had this highest relationship with God of following God in simple obedience, and who taught us also to have a morality that would make us to be true followers of Jesus. The miracles of the Bible are not necessary, they didn’t literally happen. All of the apocalyptic parts of the Bible, apocalyptic has to do with all these crazy things about angels and demons and heaven and hell and the future resurrection, all that stuff, that can all be swept away.

All that is the mere husk, that’s the chaff that can just be thrown aside. What remains is the kernel, what remains is the essence of Christianity, which is the religion of Jesus himself. Harnack actually wrote a book that was based on some lectures he gave, but then he put them in the form of a book in the year 1900, and the book was titled, The Essence of Christianity, or What is Christianity? Harnack said that the essence, the kernel of Christianity, the part that you don’t throw out, the part that’s there, that’s key, consists in the kingdom of God. And its coming, by which he didn’t mean something big and dramatic like apocalyptic and angels and resurrection and all that, but simply the coming of the kingdom as a still and mighty power in the hearts of men. It’s simply the rule of God in our hearts.

In other words, it’s the fatherhood of God and the infinite value of the human soul. Quote, God’s fatherhood is the main article in Jesus’s message, he said. Now I want to draw your attention to three things about this modernist understanding of the fatherhood of God, and then I want to show you how the biblical idea, as taught by Jesus, contrasts with those three things. So first, in the modernist view of the fatherhood of God, there’s no mediator between us and God. It’s just God and the soul, and the soul and its God.

That’s a quote from Harnack. That’s why this modernist version of the fatherhood of God is so useful to many Americans. Because if you take Jesus out and you make him just merely an example rather than the only mediator between God and man, no one’s offended. And you can say that all paths are equally acceptable. All paths to God are fine.

Harnack said, the gospel as Jesus proclaimed it has nothing to do with Jesus. It only has to do with the Father and not with the Son. Jesus is just there as an appendage who’s like the highest example of someone who had a relationship with the Father. The gospel has to do with the Father only and not with the Son. That’s the first thing.

It’s the Christless nature of this idea of the fatherhood of God. Secondly, It follows from this that there is no need for the atoning death of Christ and his resurrection from the dead to save us and bring us into a right relationship with God the Father.

Harnack rejected doctrines such as the Trinity, the two natures of Christ, and substitutionary atonement as unnecessary metaphysical speculation. In their place, he emphasized morality, summarized as love for one’s neighbor and expressed chiefly through social action.

Jesus did not come to save us from our sins on this view. Instead, he came to show us the Father and to help us live good lives as we seek the betterment of society and, quote, live out the gospel by loving our neighbor. That’s an interesting phrase, living out the gospel. If the gospel is that Christ died for our sins and rose again for our justification, how do you live that out?

You can only live it out if you change the gospel and turn it into something else, which is this moralistic, social, activistic view. So first, the Christless nature. Secondly, that it’s moralism. And then third, there’s a universalistic emphasis to this modernist version of the gospel.

Harnack said, Jesus Christ calls to every poor soul. He calls to everyone who bears a human face. You are children of the living God. So Jesus says to everyone out there, whether they’re believers or not, you are a child of God. You are part of this kingdom of God. Quote, the whole of humanity and the world without any exception is included, Harnack said.

The Biblical Fatherhood of God

The teaching of Jesus concerning the fatherhood of God stands in sharp contrast with this modernist view. The ironic thing is that they appeal to the Sermon on the Mount for this. They thought that the Sermon on the Mount, if you just take out all the other parts about the death of Christ and the claims about the deity of Christ, and you just take these three chapters, Matthew 5, 6, and 7, if you just take those three chapters, you can make that the essence of Christianity. Ironically, the Sermon on the Mount itself teaches against that. So first, whereas the modernist view says that Jesus is dispensable husk, the biblical view of the fatherhood of God says that Jesus is the kernel.

He isn’t just a teacher who comes along and informs us, oh, by the way, God is the Father and you’re His child. Rather, in other words, Jesus isn’t just like teaching us about the Father. Rather, He reveals the fatherhood of God in His own person because He is the Father’s eternally begotten Son. That’s the key idea. Jesus reveals the fatherhood of God.

That word reveals is ambiguous. Sometimes it just means reveals in the sense of like telling people about something. If that’s what it means, then Jesus is just a teacher who’s just telling us about informing us of something we didn’t know. But there’s another way we can use this word reveals.

Jesus reveals the fatherhood of God by being the father’s son. He reveals it in his own being as the eternal son of God incarnate. If you look in Matthew 3, so going back to a few chapters earlier, at the baptism of Jesus, we hear this voice from heaven, which is the voice of God the Father saying, this is my beloved Son with whom I am well pleased. In saying this, the voice is implicitly understood to be the voice of the Father. And if God the Father has a Son, then God must be the Father. The son implies the father and the father implies the son.

As the son of the father, Jesus alone uniquely reveals the fatherhood of God. Only those who come to faith in Jesus, only those who follow Jesus as his disciples become the sons of God in union with him. Jesus is the son of God by nature. We are adopted sons of God by grace. We are adopted into the family of God through Christ, God’s only begotten son. We can call God our Father only because we are looking to Christ, the Son, as our Savior. Since only He, since only this One, the Son of God reveals the Father, our Sonship is mediated through Him.

We see this throughout the Gospel of Matthew. For example, in Matthew 11, there’s an amazing verse, Matthew 11, verse 27, where Jesus says this. He says, all things have been handed over to me by my father, and no one knows the son except the father, and no one knows the father except the son, and anyone to whom the son chooses to reveal him. But it’s not just later on. It’s right here in the Sermon on the Mount itself. You see the centrality and divine authority of Jesus right here in the Sermon on the Mount. You even see his deity here in the Sermon on the Mount. Where do you see it? Well, for example, in Matthew 5, we just went through all those six antitheses. They’re called antitheses because Jesus said, you’ve heard that it was said, but I say unto you. He says that six times. You’ve heard that it was said you shall not murder, But I say to you, everyone who’s angry with his brother will be liable to judgment. You’ve heard that it was said, an eye for an eye, but I say to you, do not resist the one who is evil.

That’s an amazing thing for Jesus to do that because he’s, when he says, you’ve heard that it was said, he’s quoting from the law of God. He’s quoting from God’s own revelation at Mount Sinai when God revealed the law to his people. What mere man could come along and say, you’ve heard that it was said, but now I say to you. That expresses divine authority. Only someone who has this stupendous quality of being the son of God can say that. Now, of course, he’s not saying, you’ve heard that it was said, and that’s wrong, and now I’m telling you something new. He’s saying, you’ve heard that it was said, and that is true, but let me show you the deeper significance of that. And so he is putting himself on the level with Yahweh of the Old Testament.

He is saying that he has the authority to reveal truth. He is divine. Another indication of the deity of Christ in the Sermon on the Mount is in Matthew chapter 7. Remember that passage where Jesus says, not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven? Now in that passage, Jesus puts himself on the throne of divine judgment.

He says, on that day many will say to me, what day is that? That’s the day of judgment. Many will say to me, Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and cast out demons in your name and do many mighty works in your name? And then I will declare to them, I never knew you. Depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.” Isn’t that incredible? He has the authority to judge. Again, just like he has the authority to reveal God’s will, that’s a divine authority, so also he has the authority to judge. That is divine authority.

There’s a really helpful book by J. Gresham Machen called, Things Unseen. And it’s actually the radio addresses that he gave over public radio in Philadelphia in the 1930s. And they’re written, or the way that the radio addresses are written, they’re not all this technical theology. They’re written for lay people. They’re written for the common man, even for unbelievers.

And one of the things that Machen was dealing with at that time was this modernistic view of Christianity that came from Germany and then it began to infect the American church. It was this whole thing called the Fundamentalist Modernist Controversy where the liberals were denying the deity of Christ and beginning to revise Christianity into this modernistic view. And so he has a chapter, which was one of the addresses that he gave over the radio, called The Sermon on the Mount and the Deity of Christ. And he’s saying, look, you are all pointing to the Sermon on the Mount as this great proof of this form of Christianity that is not focused upon Christ and that gets rid of all these fancy doctrines like the Trinity and the substitutionary atonement and all that, and you just have this ethical Christianity that teaches a moralistic version of what it means to be a Christian. He says, let’s look at the Sermon on the Mount itself, and we will see that it does not support your theory.

Quote, what is the scene to which we are transported in these verses? He’s commenting on the passage I just quoted when Jesus says, on that day, many will say to me, Lord, Lord. What is the scene to which we are transported in these verses? It is the tremendous scene of the last judgment, the court from which there is no appeal, the final decision that determines the eternal destinies of men.

Who is it that is represented here as sitting on the judgment seat of God? Who is it that is represented here in this supposedly pleasant, purely ethical, practical, ultra-modern, non-theological Sermon on the Mount? And by this supposedly simple teacher of righteousness who kept his own person out of his message and was careful not to advance any lofty claims. There can be no doubt whatever about the answer to that question.

The one represented here as sitting on the judgment seat of God is Jesus himself. Upon Jesus’s decision depends the fate of all men. I do just beg you to think of that for a moment, my friends. Jesus of Nazareth certainly did believe that he would sit upon the judgment seat of God at the terrible last judgment day and that his word would be final and that his and that life in his presence would be heaven, and that departure from him would be hell.“. Because he says, depart from me, you workers of lawlessness. He says, depart from me. So departure from him would be hell. What has become of the weak, sentimental, purely human, purely ethical Jesus of modern reconstruction? What has become of your Jesus who was a simple teacher of righteousness and advanced no claim to be God? What will you do with Jesus? Will you treat him with mild approval? Ah, people are so patronizing in the presence of Jesus today. They say such kind, polite things about him.

They say his ethics will solve the problems of society, but they will not receive him as their savior. They are not interested in his atoning blood. God grant that it may not be so with you, my friends. God grant that you may not treat him as a religious genius or as the founder of one of the world’s religions. God grant instead that you may say to Jesus, with doubting Thomas, my Lord and my God.

It’s interesting, too, at the end of the Sermon on the Mount, the people who were listening, there were, of course, the disciples, but then there were also the larger crowds in the periphery listening in. And it says, when Jesus finished all these sayings, the crowds were astonished at his teaching, for he was teaching them as one who had authority and not as the scribes. What scribe could say, you have heard that it was said in the law of God, but I say unto you, A scribe can only say, well, this is my interpretation, or a rabbi so-and-so taught me that this is the correct oral tradition to interpret it. He spoke with absolute authority as the divine Son of God.

That’s the first difference then between the modernist view of the fatherhood of God and that which is proclaimed by Jesus himself here in the Sermon on the Mount itself. And that is that the fatherhood of God is Christocentric. The fatherhood of God is centered upon the Son of God through whom the Father is revealed. But second, whereas the modernist view of the fatherhood of God says the atonement is not necessary and that all we need is morality, the biblical view says that the atoning work of Christ is central to the fatherhood of God.

Recall the whole gospel foundation of the Sermon on the Mount, which is Matthew 1-4, where Jesus is revealed as God’s incarnate obedient son. Jesus’ teaching about the fatherhood of God in the Sermon on the Mount rests on the gospel foundation of Matthew 1-4, where it is clear that Jesus, and Jesus only, is God’s obedient son. He is the obedient Israel. Israel failed to live up to its identity as God’s son. Israel failed the test, but Jesus passed the test and won the inheritance for his people.

I’ve said this before, maybe you remember, this is way back I think in January, but I believe that the gospel account of the earthly life of Jesus, and this applies not only to the gospel of Matthew, but also to Mark and Luke, And maybe even the Gospel of John as well. But the Gospel account of the earthly life of Jesus is like a clothesline.

With two pillars. The first pillar, I’ll put it on this side so it makes sense for you. The first pillar over here is the baptism and the testing of Jesus. And that’s always first in the Gospels. Now it’s true that Matthew and Luke have the infancy narrative before that. But Mark begins right with the baptism and temptation of Jesus. The Gospel of John also has somewhat of a prologue dealing with the pre-incarnate Jesus, but then it immediately goes to John the Baptist and the baptism of Jesus. So the first post, the first pillar, is the baptism and the temptation and testing of Jesus.

And then at the end of the Gospels, you have what? You have the Passion narrative. All four Gospels end with an extended, detailed account of the arrest of Christ, the trial of Christ, the crucifixion of Christ, and his resurrection. So you have these two beginning and ending points. And then all across the narrative is a clothesline stretching between those two posts. The whole Gospel narrative is stretched out upon these two pillars. The baptism of Jesus and the triumphant obedience of Jesus in spite of the devil’s temptation is a pre-enactment of the end of the story when his obedience culminates in going to the cross.

He says, not my will, but your will be done in the Garden of Gethsemane. And he willingly goes to the cross, laying down his life as a sacrifice for sinners. He says he came not to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many. His blood would be shed for the forgiveness of sins. And he even met with his disciples in the night in which he was betrayed and he gave them the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper. He said, this blood is the blood of the new covenant. This blood is poured out for the forgiveness of your sins.

This bread symbolizes my body, which is broken for you so that you might be saved. So you have the beginning and the end point of the Gospels that are focused upon the work of Christ, focused upon the atoning death, the obedience of Christ to the point of death on the cross. And so everything that happens in between those two events in the Gospels has to be understood in light of those two events. And so you see that right here in Matthew 6, for example.

Right in the center of the Lord’s Prayer, what do you have? You have this prayer for forgiveness. The fifth petition of the Lord’s Prayer. Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors. That fifth petition to pray for the forgiveness of our debts, our sins being viewed as debts that we owe to God, How can that debt be paid apart from the atoning work of Christ? That fifth petition is only possible because of the beginning of the Lord’s Prayer, which is our Father. This daily reality of the forgiveness of sins is the heart of what makes it possible for us to call God our Father. Were God to hold our sins against us, we would not be able to go to Him as children to a Father. We would view Him rather as a fearful judge.

The fatherhood of God as taught and revealed by Jesus is one of the most important items on that clothesline and the specific prayer for the forgiveness of sins, which is founded upon his atoning death. So the first difference between the modernist view of the fatherhood of God and the biblical view is that the modernist view does not focus upon Christ. Jesus is just an example and he can be set aside, whereas the biblical view is that the fatherhood of God is revealed in the person and work of Christ. The second difference is that the modernist view of the fatherhood of God is that there’s no atonement necessary. There’s no blood, there’s no forgiveness necessary. Whereas in the biblical view, we can only call God our father because of the forgiveness of sins which is granted to us through the atoning death of Christ.

And then third, whereas the modernist view says the fatherhood of God is universal and that every human being is a child of God, the biblical view says that God is the heavenly father only of those adopted as sons through Jesus Christ. If Jesus as God’s son is central, and if the atonement is necessary to make us sons, then the fatherhood of God is not something that all people automatically enjoy just by being human, or just by being born, or just by being made in the image of God, as important as that truth is. It’s something that is only for the disciples of Jesus. This is clear in the teaching of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount when he contrasts the disciples throughout with two other groups of people. Who are outside of the circle of disciples. Who are those two other groups of people?

think about it. He talks about hypocrites and he talks about Gentiles. Who are the hypocrites? Hypocrites are members of the Israelite covenant community who reject Jesus as the Messiah and who continue their self-righteous attempt to earn God’s favor by their devotion to the law and also to the oral traditions of the Pharisees. The Gentiles are simply the mass of humanity outside of the covenant community. In other words, today we would just call them unbelievers or pagans.

throughout the Sermon on the Mount, he continually describes disciples as being different from hypocrites and different from Gentiles. For example, just to pull out one illustration of that, in chapter six, when he’s saying, don’t be anxious about what you’re going to wear and so on, he says that the Gentiles seek after all these things, but your Heavenly Father knows that you need them, so seek first the kingdom of God. And his righteousness and all these things will be added to you. He’s using the word Gentiles there in a different way from Paul. Paul uses the word Gentiles to refer to non-Jews, and of course Gentiles can also be Christians, can also be a part of the covenant community. But here Jesus is using it to mean those who are outside, those who are pagans, those who are not believers.

very clearly then, the fatherhood of God is not universal. It is only for the disciples. And so these are the two different concepts of the fatherhood of God. And the heart of the difference is Christology. That is, who do you think Jesus is? If Jesus is the Son of God, then we can only become sons of God through him, not apart from him.

God’s fatherhood is a precious reality. It’s not something that you just cast before swine. It’s this precious pearl. It’s this very special relationship that we have with God because of what Christ has done. It’s not something that’s automatically enjoyed by all humanity, but only by those who come to God through the appointed mediator.

Piety, True and False

let’s look now at our text here in Matthew 6, verses 1 through 18. As I said, we’re not going to look at the passage on prayer, beginning in verse 7 through 15. But notice that before it and after it, there are these three illustrations of true and false piety. Jesus here is explaining the fatherhood of God, and he’s explaining it in terms of how should we have our relationship with God.

What piety does God desire of us as we relate to him as sons? There’s an interesting thing in English. We don’t really have an adjective for the noun son. Like, sonly? Would you say we have a sonly relationship with God? That’s not a word. There is a word from Latin, though. It’s called filial. Because the Latin word for son is filius. So the adjective is filial. So we could say we have a filial relationship with God. So I’ll use that word filial. Hopefully you understand what I mean by it. It means sonly.

How do we view God as our Father and we as His sons or children? The fatherhood of God is a bi-directional relationship. God as our father loves us and he accepts us, but we in turn must trust in him and serve him and go to him as our father. We must have a filial relationship with him. If we call God our father, then we must live as though that were true. And Jesus calls us to act as sons, to be sons, to live as God’s beloved children.

And he says the primary way we can do that, or at least in this section he’s focusing on one of the ways we can do that, is by practicing true piety, not in order to gain the approval of men, but in order to secure the approval of our Father. In Matthew 6, 1-18, Jesus warns against doing various acts of piety in public in order to receive the approval and the applause of men.

Three Illustrations of True Piety

He gives three illustrations of this. Charitable giving in verses 1-4, prayer in verses 5-15, and fasting in verses 16-18. And don’t worry, I’m not going to go through each one of those in detail. I’m just going to pull out the main thought that comes from all three of those. In each of those three things, he says, don’t be like the hypocrites who do this thing, whether it’s fasting or praying or giving to the poor. Don’t do this in order to be seen by others.

Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward. But when you do this thing, praying, fasting, etc., do it in secret, and your father who sees in secret will reward you. It’s almost like a poetic refrain, because he has this phrase that occurs over and over again. So in verse 2, he says, “‘Truly I say to you, they have received their reward.’” He says it again in verse 5, at the end, “‘Truly I say to you, they have received their reward.’” But at that time, he’s doing it in reference to prayer. And then with reference to fasting, he says it again in verse 16, “‘Truly I say to you, they have received their reward.’” And then the same phrase again is used, “‘But you, on the other hand, do it in secret, and your father who sees in secret will reward you.’” And again, he says that three times, once for each of the three illustrations.

Don’t do charitable giving to be seen by others to get their approval and praise. Rather, do your charitable giving in secret so that your father may reward you. Don’t go out and pray in public, standing in the corners, making a big show of how pious you are. Rather, go into your closet, pray in private, so that your father may reward you. With regard to fasting, don’t put on a big show of disfiguring your face when you fast to make it seem like you’re super pious and super sorry for your sins, but rather wash your face and when you fast, no one will even know that you are fasting so that your Father may reward you. Notice that in each of these three illustrations, Jesus says that the hypocrites who do these things to be seen by others have received their reward.

It’s in the past tense. They have received their reward. They are those who do their acts of piety as a public show. And so what is their reward? What’s the reward that they’ve received? It is the applause and the approval of men. Yay! Look what a pious person you are.

The Father’s Approval Is the Reward

By contrast, those who do these things secretly or in private, so that no one but God knows, will receive a reward from God. Now here’s the key. If the reward that the hypocrites received was the approval of men, then logically, what is the reward for those who do these pieties in secret? It’s that they will receive approval of God, the Father, the approval of God. The Father’s approval is our reward.

Isn’t that interesting? There’s a lot of discussion among Christians about this idea of rewards. Will there be future rewards for Christians based upon their service to the Lord, their ministry, all these things. And it’s interesting that when Jesus talks about rewards, he doesn’t view it as something physical. It’s not like a bigger mansion in heaven with more rooms and other people. It’s not a bigger crown with more jewels in it. The reward is simply the Father’s approval on that final day.

Or as Jesus will say later in the Gospel of Matthew, when he’s talking about this idea of rewards for his servants, remember the parable of the talents, he says, Jesus will say, well done, good and faithful servant. That is enough, is the approval of God. So we need to think about that. We need to think about this issue of Are we doing our piety in order to receive our reward now in the form of the approval and applause of men, or are we resting in our Heavenly Father’s approval?

Are we seeking to serve Him? In a way, that’s just another way of saying that you are serving the Lord in faith, because faith means seeing the unseen realities. If you’re serving the Lord not in faith, but for something now, whether it’s the approval of men or something earthly, then you’re not doing it in faith. But if you’re serving the Lord in faith, then you’re looking to the unseen reality of your heavenly Father’s approval, which you experience now through the gospel and which will be brought out in reality at the last day.

The Father’s approval must be enough for us. And that means that the Father himself must be real to us. And how can the Father become more real to us? It’s by going back to Jesus, because Jesus reveals the Father. You come to Jesus, you follow his example, and you become a son of the Father, just as Jesus was. Jesus knew about this. Jesus knew that the approval of men was nothing. He knew that men were fickle. One day they love you, the next day they dump you. He knew that men have poor judgment.

Have you ever thought about this? Have you ever considered this reality that people will say nice things about you. And at the moment, you’re like, yeah, this is good. And you feel good. And your ego is stroked. And you enjoy that feeling of the praise of men. But then you realize that same person also said some great things about some other idiot over there. And their judgment is obviously no good. So why am I so happy with that they’re praising me?

They’re adoring people that I despise. So don’t think so highly of man. Don’t think that their approval is that important. The approval of man is worth nothing in comparison with the approval of God. The approval of man is second rate. It’s fickle. It’s here today and gone tomorrow. And it comes from people whose judgment is not all that great.

As a follower of Jesus, you must live as he lived, as one who was despised and rejected by men, but he was well-pleasing to the Father. Remember the voice from heaven, this is my beloved Son, in whom I am perfectly well-pleased, even though all the Jewish leaders, the scribes, the Pharisees, the high priests, they all rejected him. The approval of God the Father is so much more precious than the fading and fickle applause of sinful men.

That’s how we can have this filial piety, to live as sons of the Father. That is by resting in the Father’s approval. Not just looking for it, not just waiting for it at the last day, but resting in it. And now, and being satisfied with it. Knowing that the Father’s approval is enough. Because the Father himself is more real to us than men. Jesus did this perfectly.

As God’s obedient son, he fully rested in his Father’s approval. Everyone misunderstood him. The disciples even forsook him. Everyone failed to give him the approval and the honor that he deserved. And yet he did not change his message. He didn’t curtail his teaching in order to get the favor of man. He persevered in the hard path of obedience, even though it meant great suffering and humiliation, because he fixed his eyes solely on the Father’s approval. And he received that seal of approval when God the Father raised him from the dead and vindicated his life and his message.

Let us look to Christ and find our all in him. As we do, let us become more like him by following him in obedience to the Father’s will. Christ not only reveals that God is our heavenly Father; by his own example he shows us how God’s children live.

We fall far short of his perfect sonship. We do not seek God’s glory or rest in his approval as we ought. Yet for Christ’s sake the Father forgives us and receives us as adopted children. Let us therefore imitate the Son, rest in the Father’s approval, and serve him with undivided hearts.